Leaving Warsaw: July 9, 2019

Wow, it is hard to believe that my three months in Warsaw are over. Last night I got together with friends for one last meal at my favorite restaurant in Warsaw, Da Aldos. We were served by our favorite waitress. As usual, she was outstanding. I love the fact that the restaurants in europe still expect you to have the table all night, and don’t try to turn it. The only time I have really had to worry about that is restaurants, which advertise two seatings. in I stayed out way too late, and didn’t get much sleep.

Tiny local Chanterelles mushrooms in butter garlic sauce. Poles are crazy about mushrooms.

If I wanted to have desert, I could only eat half my egg, bacon, and gorgonzola pizza. I told Gina to take the rest home and have it for breakfast.

Tiramisu, with my usual bite out of it before photographs.

I had to get up at 03:30 this morning to get to the airport three hours before my flight. I had done most of my packing the day before, but I rushed around cleaning out the fridge and packing my electronics. Since it was so early, I left the key in a prearranged hiding place, for my landlord to pick up. I felt a little sad, walking away from the building which had been my home for 90 days.

As I stood waiting to cross the street to the bus stop, I saw my bus drive past. I walked to the bus stop and found that the N46 wasn’t the only bus going to the central bus station. The N13 and the N63 also would get me there in plenty of time. As I was reading the posted schedules the street lights clicked off. Though sunrise was at 04:30 the sky was bright at a quarter past. The N63 came first. My friend had warned me that the night buses had to be flagged down, so I was ready, standing on the curb, waving away.

As I sat among the morning commuters, I noticed that the canned bus voice was saying the same thing over and over in Polish, right after announcing the name of the next stop. I wasn’t sure what it was, but I wasn’t worried, knowing that when I got to the central rail station, I would recognize it. A few days before leaving, I walked down to the station and made sure I knew what bus stop I would be coming in at and how to get to the bus stop, where I could catch the bus to the airport.

Just before the bus arrived at central station, the canned voice announced the stop in Polish and then in English. That made me smile. I guess that central station is the one place english speakers need to find.

I had no trouble walking between the two bus stops, and was further assured when I saw all the people with luggage waiting for the bus to the airport. The night bus came before the day bus, so I took N32 to the airport. As soon as the bus started making stops, I noted that all the announcements were now made in english and Polish. The announcement made over and over, was just one letting everyone know that the bus only stopped when one of the stop buttons were pressed.

Once I got into the terminal at the airport, I saw the self check-in machines. I had no trouble checking into my flights and went off to look for a lounge. There were two lounges that I could use with my Priority Pass. Only one was open so early. It turned out to be very nice. I ate some breakfast and had several cups of coffee, before settling in to read until my flight.

As I was reading a man came over and asked if I would participate in a survey on my satisfaction with the lounge. I had seen him interviewing people before, so I wasn’t worried that he was pulling something. My form of travel had him filling in a lot of things into the “other” section of his survey form. I was glad to do it since I was so satisfied with the lounge.

The flight to Copenhagen was short an hour and five minutes, but it seemed very long. At the last minute, before they closed the plane doors, several Russian men were rushed on board. The one who sat down across the aisle from me stank like rotten onions. I was so glad to get off the plane in Copenhagen and go looking for the next lounge.

My flight from Copenhagen to Boston has been delayed, but if there are no more delays I should be able to make my Boston to Houston flight. Keeping my fingers crossed. The other lounges at this airport have a three hour limit. This one did not list a limit, so I am hoping that there isn’t one. It does have the drawback of letting children in, but the kids here are very well behaved.

As I sit in the lounge working my way through the Carlsberg beers offered in the lounge, I am enjoying watching a little girl who has all the engery her parents don’t have. There five different Carlsbergs here., but the glasses are only 250 ml. If I drink all five, that is only 1.25 pints. The lounge is sponsored by Carlsberg, that is why they have the beers on tap here.

Now that I have some time on my hands, I weighed my bags with my fish scale. The under the seat bag is coming in at 4.9 kilos and the overhead bag is weighs 7.8 kilos. The reason for the total weigh coming in at 12.7 kilos, rather than the official 13.7 kilos, is that the things I am wearing are not included. Also, I left two pairs of pants in Warsaw. I wanted to replace them in the US, so there was no reason to tote them all the way back to Houston.

My blog will be a little out of order here, as I am not going to write about my last days in Poland until after this post is published.